Grantcoulson's Blog

    “Incentives are the cornerstone of modern life. And understanding them–or, often, ferreting them out–is the key to solving just about any riddle, from violent crime to sports cheating to online dating.” From Freakonomics by Levitt and Dubner.

from the book: Shadow Dancing on the Grave of Hope:

     One of the central errors of the left is, “If there is inequality, there must be inequity.” If a group has a lower income, less education, poorer housing, etc., this must be the result of systemic and systematic discrimination toward them. This is such nonsense that only university-based or government-sponsored groups maintain it. Groups differ in many ways; behavior toward work, attitudes to the use and value of time, dependability, attitudes to training and education, reverence for deferred goals, saving, and etc. To expect groups with different value systems to achieve at the same level is a fevered dream. Yet much of the rhetoric of “social justice” supporting government intervention is directed by the notion of systemic discrimination. Favored groups become net tax consumers which further degrades their ability to function. And that’s socialism for you.   

    “The most fundamental fact about the ideas of the political left is that they do not work. Therefore we should not be surprised to find the left concentrated in institutions where ideas do not have to work in order to survive."–Thomas Sowell. Dr. Sowell could have added that places such as political organizations, universities, government schools and other state-run institutions are places where ideas do not have to work and, in accord with his observation, these are the places where the ideas of the political left find homes. Socialism is supported by the young, university professors, politicians, members of the social sciences and social services–all members of groups which need produce nothing but spin to show the exceptional potential which can only be unleashed by application of their progressive concepts.

    Socialism in action is a few people making decisions which affect millions. Free enterprise is millions of people making decisions which affect primarily themselves.

    A socialist believes that perfection is attainable with enough legislation and that efficiency is irrelevant. A libertarian believes that perfectibility is irrelevant because it is unattainable and  that legislation drives mankind further from efficiency.

    Socialist theory holds that socialism has two main virtues. The first is that it is a more efficient and equitable economic system. This has been disproved in all cases. The second is that the relentless indoctrination by socialist institutions will produce a “new socialist man” who will be wise, socially responsible and eager to serve the state with  selfless heroism, giving his time, effort and fortune to the common good. This has also been demonstrated to be false because most of the pretended altruism under socialism is, as Ambrose Bierce said, “The conduct of public affairs for private advantage.”

    “From each according to his ability, to each according to his needs."  Karl Marx.  Karl hadn’t consulted a behavior analyst. If he had, he would have been told that application of his incentive-destroying rule would decrease ability (from–output) and increase need (to–amount of free stuff required). This guiding principle of communism ensures, according to a reinforcement analysis, that  ability will be reduced  and needs increased,  outcomes which have occurred wherever this has been tried. The rule about “redistribution of income” reduces the incentive of both the tax-producer and the tax-consumer. “Why should I work harder if my wealth is taken from me”, and “Why should I work for wealth if it is given to me?”  A lot of people try to get on the “free government money” bandwagon by demonstrating their great level of “need” and victim status.

    The belief in benign and effective government agencies leads to the widest separation between the recipients of the service and the providers, to the widest separation between pay and usefulness. It ensures the service will be many times less efficient than non-government alternatives. The less influence the recipient has over the economic benefits of the provider,  the less productive the service will be. Socialism will never be successful because those who make economic decisions have no stake in the outcome. Thence, their behavior is ineffective and wildly wrong.   

Cheerio and ttfn,
Grant Coulson
Cui Bono–Cherchez les Contingencies

   If the content of your blog is, “What Works in Psychology”, why do you go on about Global Warming, economics and other government failures? Most social sciences such as education, rehabilitation and psychological therapy of various kinds are done by government workers or take place under various kinds of government sponsorship. This makes these enterprises, because of the lack of proper incentives, of very little value. Almost every government activity is so filled with error, waste and unbelievable inefficiency and top-heavy with useless administration that all examples of such are merely more indices of what happens when incentives are ignored.

     The supply of good programs is adequate enough to improve current results by a substantial factor. Demand for good programs is  practically so close to zero that it will keep aggregate results from increasing substantially under current circumstances.

    This is another example. Green jobs and technology are primary based on the unsupported belief in Global Warming. The corrupt practice of supporting nonsense is discussed here. Some quotes from the article.

     “President Obama has made the creation of green jobs a centerpiece of his economic agenda. Becoming the “world leader in developing the clean energy technologies that will lead to the industries and jobs of tomorrow” is described by the Administration as “critical to the future of our country.” They are investing billions in pursuit of this goal.”

       “Comparisons of wind, solar, nuclear, natural gas, and coal sources of power coming on line by 2015 show that solar power will be 173% more expensive per unit of energy delivered that traditional coal power, 140% more than nuclear power and natural gas and 92% more expensive than wind power. Wind power is 42% more expensive than coal and 25% more expensive than nuclear and natural gas power.”

    “Taxpayers should also be warned that creating a “green job” can be expensive. One report examining state and local efforts to encourage the creation of “green jobs” found that the subsidies sometimes exceed $100,000 per job created.”

Cheerio and ttfn,
Grant Coulson
Cui Bono–Cherchez les Contingencies

     Revision of the  Diagnostic and Statistical Manual (5th) version, , aka  the “Billing Bible”,  of the American Psychiatric Association is under way. Created by consensus, lobbying and advocacy, the opposite of science, the DSM5 will define many more people as “mentally ill” and open up many more avenues for peddling ineffective psychopharmaceuticals. Labeling is supposed to lead to effective treatment, but it rarely does.

    A “rubber room” in New York City is where they keep teachers who are suspended. These folk keep their full salaries before, during and after “disciplinary” hearings. One chap has been receiving his salary, over $100K, as a non-working typing teacher since 2001. Public education needs the money so it can waste it.

from the book: Shadow Dancing on the Grave of Hope:

    “The man of system… seems to imagine that he can arrange the different members of a great society with as much ease as the hand arranges the different pieces upon a chess-board; he does not consider that the pieces upon the chess-board have no other principle of motion besides that which the hand impresses upon them; but that, in the great chess-board of human society, every single piece has a principle of motion of its own, altogether different from that which the legislator might choose to impress upon it.” Adam Smith, The Theory of Moral Sentiments, Part VI, Section II, Chapter 2.

    “Although socialism has never worked, its practitioners are neither discouraged nor discredited.” Thomas Sowell.

    The prime belief of socialism, and other theories of government, is that someone has to be in charge of things–everything must be managed. There is no faith in the ability of people to manage themselves or rather, the elite have ultimate faith in their ability to manage others. No matter how hard you hope, a sincere belief is not a fact.

    “Whatever you’re doin’ in there, you’re doin’ it wrong and I could do it better.”, Best man’s advice to a honeymooning couple or socialist advice to anybody.

    Where faulty paradigms find homes

     "There are more Marxists on the Harvard faculty than in Eastern Europe". George Will.

    It (religion) is the opium of the people.(Marx)
    Socialism is the religion of the university. (Coulson)
   Therefore, socialism is the opium of the university.(Inevitable conclusion)

    The problem with socialism is the problem of incorrect contingencies.
    The problem with the social sciences is that most practitioners operate under socialism.
    Thence, the problem with the social sciences is the problem of incorrect contingencies.

    There is overwhelming evidence for the grip socialism has on the academy, the hub of superiority, enlightenment and entitlement. Since universities consider themselves the place where elites dwell, the only ones who know the correct direction for society, pronouncements are constantly issuing from them which are so wrong, they are valuable only for their chuckle factor. Consider this quote from Paul Samuelson, in a popular university  introductory textbook on economics made in the 1989 edition, published just before the Soviet Union dissolved, from, among other reasons,  an inability to make toilet paper, computers, cars, and a variety of other consumer goods. Samuelson said, “The Soviet economy is proof that … a socialist command economy can function and even thrive.” It never thrived, and then, didn’t function. Sales of the textbook continued unabated after this massive predictive failure– a predictive failure, a failure in the easiest of all the scientific steps, not a production failure.

Cheerio and ttfn,
Grant Coulson
Cui Bono–Cherchez les Contingencies

     “Great nations are never impoverished by private, though they sometimes are by public prodigality and misconduct. The whole, or almost the whole public revenue, is in most countries employed in maintaining unproductive hands… Such people, as they them-selves produce nothing, are all maintained by the produce of other men’s labour… Those unproductive hands, who should be maintained by a part only of the spare revenue of the people, may consume so great a share of their whole revenue, and thereby oblige so great a number to encroach upon their capitals, upon the funds destined for the maintenance of productive labour, that all the frugality and good conduct of individuals may not be able to compensate the waste and degradation of produce occasioned by this violent and forced encroachment.” Adam Smith. And that’s socialism for you.

    “What is especially disturbing about the political left is that they seem to have no sense of the tragedy of the human condition. Instead, they tend to see the problems of the world as due to other people not being as wise or as noble as themselves.”  Thomas Sowell.

    The socialist John Maynard Keynes had a central theme, according to his biographer Robert Skidelsky, which is that "the state is wise and the market is stupid."  "Working from that sort of perspective, India’s top economists for a generation supported policies of regulation and central control that failed abysmally — leading one of them to lament recently, ‘India’s misfortune was to have brilliant economists.’” (George Will). These brilliant economists were brilliant only on the INTEND-IS side while failing, of course, on the DOES side–shiny in the academy and dull in the market.

    “The idea behind giving professors lifetime tenure is that this will enable them to speak out freely. But it would be hard to name any other occupation with a more cowardly record than academics, who have been giving in to politically correct campus bullies ever since the 1960s.” Thomas Sowell. This is the effect of giving someone a “Golden Rice Bowl” or Job For Life. It makes them less courageous, not more. Most universities are a microcosm of socialism: The professors have jobs for life, travel predictable paths and need produce nothing useful, but generate stunningly similar nonsense.

    “No matter how well you do, we are the ones who do good.” Socialist assumption.

    “The whole aim of practical politics is to keep the populace alarmed (and hence clamorous to be led to safety) by menacing it with an endless series of hobgoblins, all of them imaginary.” H. L. Mencken. If H.L. were alive today, he would undoubtedly present “GLOBAL WARMING” as one of these imaginary hobgoblins used to scare school children and others under thought control.

Cheerio and ttfn,
Grant Coulson
Cui Bono–Cherchez les Contingencies

from the book: Shadow Dancing on the Grave of Hope:

    “The study of history is a powerful antidote to contemporary arrogance. It is humbling to discover how many of our glib assumptions, which seem to us novel and plausible, have been tested before, not once but many times and in innumerable guises; and discovered to be, at great human cost, wholly false.” Paul Johnson.

    There is no point in setting anything in motion without understanding the “Calculus of Incentives”. All must revolve on this axis, no system involving government workers can ever be reformed because the essential problem of no economic responsibility will never change.

    “Politicians can do more funny things naturally than I can think of to do on purpose." Will Rogers.

    “They have the usual socialist disease; they have run out of other people’s money.” Margaret Thatcher.

    Friedrich Hayek, the Nobel Prize-winning economist said: "The curious task of economics is to demonstrate to men how little they really know about what they imagine they can design." (emphasis added).

    “It would be hard to think of a more ridiculous way to make decisions than to transfer those decisions to third parties who pay no price for being wrong.” Thomas Sowell.

    Socialism, like all man-made disasters begins with a reasonable, humanistic intent to better the lives of others. Once the intent is there, it becomes easy to assume the method is secondary because intense sincerity is an integral part of the philosophy and the socialist analysis, like most analyses of human behavior seems so logical that facts are unnecessary. Translated into the IS, this reasonable, humanistic intent produces a regal, inefficient bureaucracy protected by the State and surrounded by a slick, relentless public relations apparatus. Socialism’s assumptive conceit is that those who believe they know the desired result know how to achieve it.

    “Of all tyrannies, a tyranny sincerely exercised for the good of its victims may be the most oppressive. It would be better to live under robber barons than under omnipotent moral busybodies. The robber baron’s cruelty may sometimes sleep, his cupidity may at some point be satiated; but those who torment us for our own good will torment us without end for they do so with the approval of their own conscience.” C. S. Lewis.

Cheerio and ttfn,
Grant Coulson
Cui Bono–Cherchez les Contingencies

     The Toronto Transit Commission employee’s union, in response to several embarrassing situations recorded by the public and mentioned earlier in this blog, are striking back in classical fashion. They believe that the miscreants, caught by camera sleeping during duty, or neglecting their jobs, are the victims, not the perpetrators, in the story of wasting public money. They will wax indignant and pretend injury when they are the injurers. One wonders what the real price of a subway fare is, once all the costs are added in. We’ll never know, but the spin machine will keep insisting it’s a bargain. Once again, say “public good”, but mean, “Keep the subsidies coming.”

    Here are some facts

     “The Heritage Foundation says, "There isn’t a single light rail transit system in America in which fares paid by the passengers cover the cost of their own rides." Heritage cites the Minneapolis "Hiawatha" light rail line, soon to be completed with $107 million from the transportation bill. Heritage estimates that the total expense for each ride on the Hiawatha will be $19. Commuting to work will cost $8,550 a year. If the commuter is earning minimum wage, this leaves about $1,000 a year for food, shelter and clothing. Or, if the city picks up the tab, it could have leased a BMW X-5 SUV for the commuter at about the same price.”

    Only a third of the operating budget is covered by fares. The supposed benefits are conferred by paying for the construction costs and continuing subsidies. Imagine a business which got its infrastructure and equipment free and still lost money.

Cheerio and ttfn,
Grant Coulson
Cui Bono–Cherchez les Contingencies